"I think the results of this study are quite reassuring," Joachim Schuz of the Danish Institute of Cancer Epidemiology in Copenhagen, the lead researcher, said in an interview by cellular phone from Denmark.
The study, one of the most comprehensive to date, represented the latest evidence endorsing the safety of cellular phones. The data available to the researchers allowed them to look at a large number of cell phone users and assess potential risks many years after they first used them. "The big advantage is a whole nation is included in the study," Schuz said.
Schuz's team studied data on 420,095 Danish cell phone users (357,553 men and 62,542 women) who first subscribed for mobile service between 1982 and 1995 and were followed through 2002 -- meaning some were tracked for two decades. The researchers then compared their cancer incidence to the rest of Denmark's population.
A total of 14,249 cancer cases were seen among the cellular telephone users, a number that was lower than would be expected for that population, according to the study appearing in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.
"We were not able to identify any increased risks of any cancers that could be related to the use of the cellular phones," John Boice, a cancer epidemiologist at Vanderbilt University who worked on the research, said in an interview.
Source: Reuters
